The Unwaba Revelations:Game World Trilogy-3

The Unwaba Revelations by Samit Basu

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


   I always had second thoughts on this book because after all that happened in the second, I was not sure how he could manage to close the trilogy thrilling enough. As I expected, the last few pages were interesting and relevant. The rest all, even the battle pages were boring and looked like they were written to just fill up the pages. Alsso he created so many characters that he couldn't give enough importance to any. Characters which were the main one's in the beginning too get very less pages in the third part. Aswin character was completely neglected(it was not etched properly,intentionally i guess, right from the beginning). Even Kirin and Maya do nothing in this book. I agree that it was all supposed to be part of the plan but seeing pages and pages of Rakshas-Ravian war is not exactly interesting.

     Still, I am satisfied with the ending and the trilogy as a whole. The only regret I have is this trilogy also turned out to be like maximum trilogies, awesome and exciting first part and downhill from there. Still, am proud that an Indian managed to successfully pull off a 1500 page fantasy trilogy!



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The Manticore's Secret

The Manticore's Secret by Samit Basu

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


       This book is even better than the first part! If the first part is just a setting to introduce the main characters and start off the narration, this has lot more plot items and excellent dibs at typecasts in the fantasy genre and is equally fun and entertaining as the first one.
       The plot with all the Gods discussing the Game World is pure magic. It has elements of philosophy, making fun, surprise everything. That part is a brilliant work by Samit Basu.
        All those references to various religions, mythologies too are very subtly placed and goes with the flow. I still don't know in which genre this book goes. Its definitely a fantasy but is it a spoof of fantasy genre or a light-hearted fantasy book which pokes fun of itself? Whatever it is, I am in love with this series which is important for any fantasy tale to be successful.
       I would LOVE to see it as a motion picture trilogy like LOTR but I don't think the book is famous enough in India itself and I don't think Western people can completely understand the Genius of Basu as many references include Indian Mythology.
       I am eagerly waiting to read the third part...
       



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The Simoqin Prophecies

The Simoqin Prophecies by Samit Basu

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Never thought an Indian writer could write such a detailed fantasy book. A very good book with so many creatures and a decent story that you will never get bored. The first few chapters were a difficult to pass with so many characters getting introduced but after 60-100 pages, the book is un-putdownable.

Also the ending was a very good surprise. I am not sure how the lead characters are going to become in the second book. ****spoiler this line***** It looked like Heroes are going to become villians in the next book but need to read it to know! I already ordered the second part on flipkart.

I also enjoyed the gentle poking at traditional fantasy tales.
I highly recommend it to all readers who like fantasy tales but it is 500 pages long and only the first book of a trilogy!

The Rozabal Line

The Rozabal Line by Ashwin Sanghi
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

       This is one of the best novels I have ever read and I am proud that it was written by an Indian. Its definitely way better than Da Vinci Code(maybe I am partial to him as he is an Indian). He is India's answer to people who think CB is the face of Indian writing. Though his narration looks a bit similar to Dan Brown's, the way he handled the story is highly commendable. He almost convinces you on everything he tries to say though I feel he went a bit overboard in driving the point(but I am definetely not complaining!). You can't deny but get convinced about the origin of several religions after reading his book.

      I liked the way he gave detailed references to all his research at the end of the book(the same thing I didn't like in Chanakya's Chant).The only complaint I have is his over enthusiasm to drive home the theory of Karma and Re-birth and also the ending was too much to take. After so many interesting theories, the ending looked just too hypothetical. I can understand his need to make it look like what he did.

But I am more than happy at such a great and successful attempt by an Indian. I rate it better than the other more famous recent Indian phenomenon 'The Shiva Trilogy'. A must-read for everyone to understand history(I am not saying religion) better.

Hats-off to Ashwin Sanghi....


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Some ramblings on neurosciences

         Today I was reading an article on some experiment conducted on brain. The objective was to explain why we feel confused at times of sudden refresh like say, when you just woke up after sleeping at a new place, you get confused as to where you are and take some time to understand the situation. They claim that the brain actually has no confusion. From some experiments they carried out on rats, they say that the brain actually was taking time to retrieve memory and swaps between two memory locations, one of your regular sleeping place and other of the new place. They say that the swapping of the two memories happens so fast(125ms per memory) that you take time to process. The main problem I have with this kind of articles is how can they distinguish between "you" and "brain"? Isn't consciousness a product/alias of brain? Are the two not same? If you distinguish 'brain' and 'you' then who are 'you' if no the brain?
 One more thing I don't like about such articles is the comparison to our digital logic. The article says, our brain needs to be as speed as a 100 core processor to distinguish between the swapping of two memories whatever that means! I feel the area of neurosciences is not appreciated by everyone mainly because they feel our brain is just a much better computer than the fastest supercomputer we have. But how can we compare boolean/digital logic with the complexity of brain? Most people say its similar because of the 'all or none'(fire-nofire' behavior of neurons.But this doesn't mean brain works in digital domain! For instance, we remember somethings 'vaguely'. A computer can never remember things vaguely.Sometimes I feel maybe, quantum theory has something to explain our thinking process. If I am not wrong, according to quantum theory, a particle can be in one place with some probability which means, it can be there or not there i.e. it is vaguely there(??). So maybe the probability of the memory being present is low when you say I remember vaguely and it is high when you have all details of the memory. I am just blindly comparing, of course but get the idea.
     I also feel the big companies in Semiconductor and Software industries(as they have some AI fundaes, though I don't think their idea of AI is even remotely connected to real intelligence) should form a group with academia and other neuroscience institutes like Riken institute and start a project to understand the brain like the Human Genome Project. That might at least give one breakthrough in this area.

Inside Intel

                        For a change, I thought I could share my personal life on this blog. As most of you (if there actually are any) know, I recently transformed (had to) from a lazy insti dude to a working engineer, corporate style! Luckily for me I got into a company I have enormous respect for, though I now understand that I don't know much about the company or the industry for that matter. I joined Intel India on august 1st with a very enviable 3-day grand orientation ceremony with 160 lucky others at Leela Palace, Bangalore.

              I have learnt a lot of things about the workings of semi-conductor industry in this one month though not much has been achieved in the work I would be doing. One thing I liked about Intel was the importance given to Ethics and Values though I have my own doubts that this might be because I am a new recruit. All the senior folks seem to be dedicated enough and more importantly were quite approachable. They took a lot of pain to arrange a number of training sessions for us to have a smooth integration into the company. The Open-door policy in which you can schedule appointment with anyone in the company looked like a great idea though I guess it was not Intel's brainchild.

        I also realized that Intel is not an Almighty in semi-conductor industry. For example, AMD makes better client CPUs than Intel. Also, Intel too uses its brand name by over-pricing its products. I didn't think Intel would do it given their values though I am not saying it is un-ethical. Also I see that Intel is a traditional company in its own way, entering new arenas like mobile industry and Graphics almost a bit too late.

  
     I also got to know about Intel history a lot though any of this is available to everyone. I never knew about Andy Grove, the man who turned Intel fortunes and who is considered the most influential man in semi-conductor industry. His character was inspiring and interesting to know about.
    One thing I realized is, though I am a Master of Engg in VLSI from IITM, I knew very little of the industry and its workings. There seems to be a huge gap between industry and college education in Semiconductor industry. We don't even know the flow process properly or half the technical terms used here. I guess this is the case with any other engineering stream in India(This should be the topic for a different post).
    Finally, my first month at Intel is not at all complete without mentioning Foosball! I saw the game on Friends but never thought it to be so awesome! My first two weeks were spent on playing Foosball while attending training sessions in between till the table got damaged.

   Overall, the transition was not as painful as I thought it would be, but I miss IIT-M and my friends a lot. I miss the campus and the lazy life-style there. I miss jogging in the green campus and watching hundreds of  movies and sit-coms. But I think I am utilizing my time a little better now than in campus as I am learning a lot of new things at a much better rate.

  I would like to end with a couple of quotes by two CEOs of Intel:
    " Our business model is one of very high risk. We dig a very big hole in the ground, spend three billion dollars to build a factory in it, which takes three years, to produce technology we haven't invented yet, to run products we have designed yet, for markets which don't yet exist.
      We do that two or three times a year.
       Everything we do has an inherent belief in technology. " - Paul Otellini, present CEO of Intel.
 
    " What we start off with, is sand. Rest all is value added by people." - Andy Grove.

Memorable Lines from Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy-2

Here is a list of awesome one-liners from H2G2-2 which is: The Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

1.There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.
   There is another theory which states that this has already happened.

2."A personal friend?" inquired the Vogon, who had heard the expression somewhere once and decided to try it out.
   "Ah, no," said Halfrunt, "in my profession you know, we do not make personal friends."
   "Ah," grunted the Vogon, "professional detachment."
  "No," said Halfrunt cheerfully, "we just don't have the knack."

3."Concentrate," hissed Zaphod, "on his name."
   "What is it?" asked Arthur.
   "Zaphod Beeblebrox the Fourth."
   "What?"
   "Zaphod Beeblebrox the Fourth. Concentrate!"
   "The Fourth?"
   "Yeah. Listen, I'm Zaphod Beeblebrox, my father was Zaphod
   Beeblebrox the Second, my grandfather Zaphod Beeblebrox the Third..."
   "What?"
   "There was an accident with a contraceptive and a time machine.
   Now concentrate!"


4. Life is wasted on the living.

5."If you ever find you need help again, you know, if you're in trouble, need a hand out of a tight corner ..."
   "Yeah?"
   "Please don't hesitate to get lost."

6. "The Guide is definitive. Reality is frequently inaccurate."

7. "Who are you?"
    "Zaphod Beeblebrox"
    "The Zaphod Beeblebrox?"
    "No, just a Zaphod Beeblebrox, didn't you hear I come in six packs?"

8."Beeblebrox, over here!" he shouted.
    Zaphod eyed him with distrust as another bomb blast rocked the building.
    "No," called Zaphod, "Beeblebrox over here! Who are you?"

9."If I ever meet myself," said Zaphod, "I'll hit myself so hard I won't know what's hit me."

10.The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy notes that the term "Future Perfect" has been abandoned since it was discovered not to be.

11.Most readers get as far as the Future Semi-Conditionally Modified Subinverted Plagal Past Subjunctive Intentional before giving up: and in fact in later editions of the book all the pages beyond this point have been left blank to save on printing costs.

12. .......in which he proves that the whole fabric of the space-time continuum is not merely curved, it is in fact totally bent.

13."But what about the End of the Universe? We'll miss the big moment."
     "I've seen it. It's rubbish," said Zaphod, "nothing but a gnab gib."
     "A what?"
     "Opposite of a big bang. Come on, let's get zappy."

14. Like every car park in the Galaxy throughout the entire history of car parks, this car park smelt predominantly of impatience.

15."Out," he said. People who can supply that amount of fire power don't need to supply verbs as well.

16.Number Two's eyes narrowed and became what are known in the Shouting and Killing People trade as cold slits, the idea presumably being to give your opponent the impression that you have lost your glasses or are having difficulty keeping awake. Why this is frightening is an, as yet, unresolved problem.

Memorable lines from Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy-1

1. Bypasses are devices which allow some people to drive from point A to point B very fast whilst other people dash from point B to point A very fast. People living at point C, being a point directly in between, are often given to wonder what's so great about point A that so many people of point B are so keen to get there, and what's so  great about point B that so many people of point A are so keen to get there. They often wish that people would  just once and for all work out where the hell they wanted to be.

2.He felt that his whole life was some kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.

3.Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.

4.The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't.

5.His father eventually died of shame, which is still a terminal disease in some parts of the Galaxy.

6.Here is what to do if you want to get a lift from a Vogon: forget it.

7.Clinching proof of the non-existence of God.
      "The argument goes something like this: `I refuse to prove that I exist,' says God, `for proof denies faith,
and without faith I am nothing.'   "`But,' says Man, `The Babel fish is a dead giveaway, isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED.' "`Oh dear,' says God, `I hadn't thought of that,' and promptly vanished in a puff of logic. "`Oh, that was easy,' says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets himself killed on the next zebra crossing.

8."I don't want to die now!" he yelled. "I've still got a headache! I don't want to go to heaven with a headache, I'd be all cross and wouldn't enjoy it!"

9."it's at times like this I really wish I'd listened to what my mother told me when I was young." "Why, what did she tell you?" "I don't know, I didn't listen."

10."So this is it," said Arthur, "we're going to die." "Yes," said Ford, "except ... no! Wait a minute!" he suddenly lunged across the chamber at something behind Arthur's line of vision. "What's this switch?" he cried. "What? Where?" cried Arthur twisting round. "No, I was only fooling," said Ford, "we are going to die after all."

11.A computer chatted to itself in alarm as it noticed an airlock open and close itself for no apparent reason. This was because Reason was in fact out to lunch.

12."Hell, I'm relieved to hear you say that," said Ford.
   "Why?"
   "Because I thought I must be going mad."
   "Perhaps you are. Perhaps you only thought I said it."

13."Life," said Marvin dolefully, "loathe it or ignore it, you can't like it."

14.What is your name, human?"
     "Dent. Arthur Dent," said Arthur.
     "Hello, Dentarthurdent,"

15.I always think that the chances of finding out what really is going on are so absurdly remote that the only thing to do is to say hang the sense of it and just keep yourself occupied.

16."What's up?"
      "I don't know," said Marvin, "I've never been there."

17."Do you have ... er, an answer to Everything? To the great Question of Life, the Universe and Everything?"
     "Yes."
      "And you're ready to give it to us?" urged Loonquawl.

      "I am. Though I don't think," added Deep Thought, "that you're going to like it."
      "Doesn't matter!" said Phouchg. "We must know it! Now!"
      "Alright," said the computer.
      "You're really not going to like it," observed Deep Thought.
      "Tell us!"
      "Alright," said Deep Thought. "The Answer to the Great Question Of Life, the Universe and Everything ...is ..." said Deep Thought, and paused.
     "Yes ...!"
     "Is ..."
     "Yes ...!!!...?"
     "Forty-two," said Deep Thought, with infinite majesty and calm.(This is my absolute favorite)
These are only the one-liners where a context is not needed to appreciate it completely.

The Complete Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

I have never come across such an insane book. I now understand why it was such a smash hit worldwide and particularly among the teenagers at the time of its radio broadcasts because it is so imaginative and very very(write as many number of 'very's you want) funny. The book isn't about the plot. The plot is just a mask to bring out the awesome one-liners. You never know where the story is going but frankly you don't care! The constant references to the vast universe and the triviality of life is so exciting! I am still in the process of completing the series but couldn't resist talking about it. I think why it clicks so much is because it is not only funny but couples it with amazing imagination and talks about 'The Life, Universe and Everything' ;). The whole mood is so up-lifting and takes the series to a much higher level.
        It is true that I found it a bit boring at some places mainly because the story is not gripping and bores you after a while. But it is worth reading for the crazy, wild and insane dialogues. I am thoroughly enjoying reading it and strongly recommend it to everyone. To further stress my point, I will soon come up with another post with a compilation of some of the best dialogues from the book which made me crack-up a lot.
        I rate it 4/5 for entertaining me so much.

The one with the 'Considerable Malpractice'

      This incident involves the Hostel Affairs Secretary of IIT-M. Now that I have captured your attention let me get to the details. It might take time to set the background so please bear with me. A couple of weeks back six of us from all possible divisions of Elec-06 batch(B-Tech & all 3 divisions of DD) went on a trip to Vizag & Aruku. Lets call the people thighs, HAS, potti, p3, dixcy and manav. We were staying at thighs' house. One night after dinner we all sat to play a game of cards. We played poker(Insti amateurs version) for a while and then decided to play Lit, a four player game.
      A small intro to the game Lit for people who doesn't know it: It basically involves four people divided into two teams(of two each). Pack of cards is divided into eight sets and the two teams have to build those eight sets(six cards in each set) by asking others for the cards. You lose your chance, if the person you asked doesn't have that card. A person cannot ask for a card of a set A if he doesn't have any other card from that particular set i.e. you need to have 'at least one card'(lets call it the base card) from a set to ask for other cards of that set. This small intro in enough to understand this incident.
      p3 & dixcy already know this game very well and thighs, potti & HAS learnt it the day before. potti, thighs, p3 and HAS started playing for a while as manav learnt about the game. After some time, dixcy replaced p3 and p3 being GOD at the game was just giving tips to the players in general.
     Couple of games went by when p3 thought of helping HAS what with insti elections coming by and told him that, it is possible for a player to fake by not asking any card from a set even if he has a base card theryby tricking others into believing he has no base card of that set. HAS was so happy at this gyan that he literally put up his famous glowing face. After some time p3 fell asleep and manav replaced potti in the game.
     HAS & thighs are one team and manav & dixcy, the other. I think its better to give the dialogue version from here.
(Right now, in the set of '9 to Ace of clubs', manav has J,Q,K,A and dixcy ran out of all his cards. So only HAS, thighs and manav are playing)
HAS to manav:     Give me king of spades.
manav gives.
HAS to manav:     Give me 10 of clubs.
manav doesn't have that card so the chance goes to manav.
manav thinks:        HAS doesn't have 10 of clubs(because he asked for it) and I don't have it which means.....
manav to thighs:    Give me 10 of clubs.
thighs gives
manav thinks:        I have all cards in the set except 9 clubs now. HAS asked me for card 10 clubs earlier which means he must have a base card at that time which must be the remaining card of the set, 9 clubs.
manav to HAS: Give me 9 of clubs.
HAS:                   yay. I don't have. I tricked you, haha.
everybody's face expression: what the hell?
manav to HAS:    How can you ask me for 10 clubs without having a base card?
HAS (again with his I-beat-you glowing face): I can do that. Ask p3 if you want. It is a 'considerable malpractice'.
Everybody started laughing at HAS when thighs mentioned that actually he too doesn't have 9 clubs. So nobody has 9 clubs! everbody is looking confused when lo and behold HAS takes the card from under his hip(we were sitting on the foor)!!! It looked to us like he deliberately hid the card and then feigned it saying its a 'considerable malpractice'.
    We were laughing our hearts out(even p3 woke up and joined us) when HAS started apologizing saying he didn't know the card was there. As we were laughing he tried to explain that he misunderstood what p3 said earlier about tricking the opponent.
      I never laughed like I did that night. From then on, till we were back in insti, we laughed at that incident at least 10 times. Now, it has become a part of our group's lingo.
I tried my level best to explain the incident but as they say, one has to be there and experience it to get the feel. So though it may not look that funny in writing, I can never forget that incident or the look on HAS face that night ever in my life.

One night @ a railway station

Foreword: The series of events described here are real-life experiences.
          A couple of months ago I had to go home suddenly(I feel so lucky for that now). So, I went to Chennai Central at 9pm in the night to catch TN express. To my utter disappointment(at that time), it was announced that the train will start late by at least 2 hours. Dejected, I was just walking to the far-end of platform 8. That is when I saw her. She was on a train on platform 7. She just took my breath away for a couple of seconds. I have never seen someone so beautiful. In true filmy style, several songs started playing in my head. I sat on a bench opposite her coach and was just staring at her. The angel was deeply immersed in a magazine. She didn't notice me for several minutes. I still remember the beautiful smile on her face when she saw me. I tried to return the favor.
        While all my world was concentrated on her for those few minutes like Arjuna's was on the bird, what I didn't realize was that her mother was sitting next to her! Gathering all my courage together, I looked away immediately on finding the mother looking straight at me. But alas, my heart could no longer bear the burden and I had to turn back and look at her. My joy knew no bounds when I find the angel still looking at me. I had to do something. I can't just keep smiling at her. Her train may leave the station at any time. I want to talk to her at any cost.
       I took out the cream biscuit packet I was carrying and walked to her window and offered it to her. She took it shyly, put the Tinkle she was reading away and proudly displayed it to her mother. The mother smiled and asked her to thank me. I asked her what class she was studying in, what her favorite cartoons are and many other things which I don't remember now. Sadly the train started leaving a minute later and she kept on waving goodbye to me till I can't see her or the train. Thus ended a beautiful half-an-hour in an otherwise tiresome journey to home.