SAHANA STRIKE

"Love is not the absence of logic but logic examined and recalculated - heated and curved to fit inside the contours of the heart"

Sometimes when you read a book, you don’t really form an opinion, you just read because you want to read. You don’t assess how you’re feeling and this book did that to me. I can’t begin to explain how amazing and cleverly crafted this book was. It wasn’t your average contemporary book full of cliches like an awkward girl who falls in love with this totally dream guy with a really obvious twist. I absolutely loathe those kinds of books.

This book was REALISTIC. It wasn’t about finding McDreamy but about dealing with tough situations, it's about finding yourself and embracing your flaws. It's about feeling vulnerable and confused and finding your own way out before jumping into a man’s arms. I love how Tamara beautifully intertwines a very raw sensitive topic into the story. I'm glad she is raising awareness about things that most people don’t like talking about.

If you plan on reading this book then get ready to swoon your bum off. Lucas is the complete package, he’s a man’s man. He can kick some ass, work multiple jobs, excels at academics, draws like an angel (and looks like one too), cooks you a great dinner, he’s super protective and wins you over with his oh so sweet lovin’. 

This book is unputdownable, if you haven’t ordered one yet, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU WAITING FOR??! Go get one! This story is just spine-tinglingly delicious. It will leave you sheepishly giddy with nostalgic butterflies. 5 fabulous stars for this gem of a book! 

“Creativity is a renewable resource. Challenge yourself every day. Be as creative as you like, as often as you want, because you can never run out. Experience and curiosity drive us to make unexpected, offbeat connections. It is these nonlinear steps that often lead to the greatest work”

The easiest 5 stars I’ve given in my life. Biz Stone, Genius. I will never forget him because he lived life with so much style and courage. He leads his life by simply trusting his gut. Me and you would have literally killed to get some of the opportunities that this man was blessed with but if it didn’t feel right, he just walked away. Google offering him a decent job, Mark Zuckerberg offering him half a billion dollars for a company that he casually created on a hackathon.

Biz was a man like no other, he put people and causes above profits. He believed in making his own opportunities and was not put down during some of the hard phases in his life. He stuck to what he believed in till the very end which made him the best candidate for success. He went on dropping out of college to painstakingly horrifyingly poor to stutteringly rich in an instant.

If you are addicted to Twitter and you’re looking for a memoir/self-help/philanthropic book then this one is for you. Listen to the story of how Twitter was born directly from the co-founder. This book is full of little trinkets of wisdom. This isn’t a story of how rich he got or how smart he was, this was a stripped down, raw human story. The story of a man, who wasn’t sucked in by fame or fortune but simply did things that felt right to him and eventually possessed the power to change the world as we now know it. 

Thank you, Biz for teaching me a lesson that I’ll take to my grave.

“Constraint inspires creativity”

To be honest, that is not the right way to frame that question. The word 'meaning' denotes something singular, there is this hidden notion that tends to objectify things. It tends to give us an impression that meaning comes out of objects and experiences but fails to focus on the relationship between the subject and the object. Life like many things is very subjective. Your meaning would come from your belief system. This belief system like our universe is never constant. It changes from one generation to the other, from one culture to the other. I have wondered if life actually had a meaning, and if that meaning was something universal or something personal. I wanted to know if oblivion was our final destination. I soon realized that I was not the only one who was wondering about the meaning of life, so I decided to ask people and here is what they had to say.

"For me life on earth means a sort of preparation for the afterlife. On a much deeper level, life on earth is like a soul tutorial. Personally, I'm here to learn how to live with soul consciousness."

“Hard question. First be proud of your mom she gave birth to you. Then just survive and make a happy life. I guess.”

"Life for me is a Ferrari."

"Life is Oxygen and Carbon-dioxide"

" Life is a long unpredictable journey, Your plan is never going to go your way but that's the beauty of it and that's what makes it worth living"

" Life to me is a SWOT analysis, to see if the person has taken various decisions according to the situation and to see how they react and how they grow with that experience."

“To die”

" Life is a game. It's all about a key to your success. To achieve it, you need to cross through many levels in the game. If you lose your life then you won't be able to continue in the game. So stick to the game, play as smart as possible, Use the bonuses you get, Collect many points as possible which makes crossing these levels a lot easier."

" Life is what you perceive it to be! Life is just in the moment, that present moment you living in. You think life is a disco then it's a disco. You think it's a garden then it's a garden. Life is the sum total of your thoughts and moments which trigger those thoughts!"

“Nothing life means nothing. It’s just something you gotta do or not”

“There is no meaning. Life is an experience. Not a quest with some task to complete.”

" Life is an art. Its where you live, laugh, love, dance, sing in your own world. Life is something that you have, you can't see what's coming in the future, and you can't get the things you lost in the past."

" Life is all about happiness and satisfaction. 'If you're satisfied you'll sleep hungry' that quote is what I believe in and I believe that's what life might be"

" The meaning of life is to add meaning to your life."

“To give life a meaning”

"According to me life is meant to be lived, it can be easy or difficult. Sometimes good, other times rough. But at every up or down in life you always learn a lesson."

" On any given day, the ultimate aim would be to wake up tomorrow. So far, I've been 100% successful. One day, I won't. But every time you wake up.... you have to create your own meaning of life."

“42”

"For me life means, to earn people and to live with them and to get better together to add this awesome flavor called smile and good memories"

"Live your life and find it yourself. What you discover is the meaning."

" I think life is a journey. People say its short but I guess it's not. People say live in the moment but I think it needs a plan to go through the full journey while enjoying the scenery around."

“To live genuinely. To experience heartbreak and the great joys of the world.”

"Life is easy like a rollercoaster. You shouldn't waste a moment by looking behind to make sure that you don't miss the exciting moment that's coming ahead."

“To get to do all the things you love with positive people in your life. And growing stronger as a person.”

So, here you go folks, the meaning of life.

“Choices. Seventeen-year-old Mia is faced with some tough ones: Stay true to her first love—music—even if it means losing her boyfriend and leaving her family and friends behind?

Then one February morning Mia goes for a drive with her family, and in an instant, everything changes. Suddenly, all the choices are gone, except one. And it's the only one that matters.

If I Stay is a heartachingly beautiful book about the power of love, the true meaning of family, and the choices we all make.”

I give it 3.5 stars out of 5.This book is simply devastatingly delightful. There were parts that made me cringe because of the overplayed cliches but overall the book was pretty great. I picked up this book because I was in the mood for something sad and I wanted to cleanse myself by shedding some tears over an emotionally gripping story that everyone I know promised would help me achieve, but it didn’t.

 I wish Mia mourned and experienced that unfathomable pain that you get by losing someone you love, but she didn’t. She was so distant from all the suffering and so was I, which didn’t make a difference to my reading experience. I didn’t particularly fall in love with Adam either but his words was the one thing that hit me hard. I just wish there was more spice and more feelings involved. Passion, thats right! That’s the word I was looking for! More passion, Mia darling! 

If you’re a sucker for teenage romance intertwined with a thrilling dilemma then this is the book for you. It starts out to be sweet and innocent and when you’re not looking it locks your heart in a poisoned frankensteiner (seriously, google it). It’s a good book to read on a rainy day. 

“If you stay, I'll do whatever you want. I'll quit the band, go with you to New York. But if you need me to go away, I'll do that, too. I was talking to Liz and she said maybe coming back to your old life would be too painful, that maybe it'd be easier for you to erase us. And that would suck, but I'd do it. I can lose you like that if I don't lose you today. I'll let you go. If you stay.”

So If you didn’t know what this book is about here is a little run down for you. 

The book follows a seventeen year old girl named Mare Barrow who happens to live in a world thats divided by blood- Red and Silver. The Reds are the commoners who are forced to do all of dirty work while the Silvers are the ones with superpowers who, you guessed it, are treated like royals.

Mare gets a job in the Silver Palace where a series of events leads her to discover that in spite of being a Red she has a power of her own which naturally makes the situation a little complicated.

Mare is forced to hide her true identity behind a mask and has been thrown into this dangerous game of power and love.

   

         “Anyone can betray anyone” oh you don’t say?! 

Mare Barrow has some serious problems. She isn’t brave she is just whinny and down right annoying. She’s that friend who yells “VAGINA!” when you’re on a phone call with your mum, seriously Mare, can you shut up for a minute? Thanks.

This book is one giant mashup of every single YA series that you’ve read. It has the essence of Hunger Games, Divergent, The Lunar Chronicles, Game of Thrones, X-men and I’m not going to lie, there were parts that even reminded me of 1984 and a tiny bit of Twilight. 

The world building was not very impressive and the plot was incredibly predictable.This book doesn’t really have a lot of romance and the love triangle sorta turned into a love square(Seriously, WTF?). Some parts of the story moved too quickly which didn’t give me enough time to fall in love with the male leads. The story bombards you with well timed cliches and if you are into that then this is the book for you. 

I certainly didn’t hate the Red Queen, there were parts of the story that I thoroughly enjoyed. If i read this book when I was 12, I would be freaking out too. But with all the hype that this book had garnered I couldn’t help feel disappointed. That being said, I’d like to give this book two and a half donuts out of five. Mmmm donuts.