Book Review: Little Baghdad

Little Baghdad – a memoir by -Weam Namou- Book Cover

Book: Little Baghdad: A Memoir About an Endangered People in an American City

Author: Weam Namou

Genre: Biographies, memoirs

Review copy: Reedsy Discovery

Available at: Amazon.in

Recommended: Must Read

A fascinating read for those who want to know the history of the struggles in our world and about the life of refugees from Iraq.

Writing a memoir is a manifestation of bravery, for one must dig into the deepest crevices and corners of memory to tell an astounding story. Little Baghdad by Weam Namou is one such brilliant effort as it fills the pages with a kaleidoscopic memory scape that is endearing and poignant.

Weam delves into the lesser-known documented history and experiences of the Chaldean Christians from Iraq, who settled in the state of Michigan in the United States. The pages carry the longing and the travails of all who must leave their homeland to seek refuge in distant pastures. The amalgamation and assimilation into a new world is a long and adventurous journey peppered with stories – sweet and bitter.

Little Baghdad is not just a glimpse of the life of settlers from another part of the globe in Michigan, it is also a historical note on the city of Detroit. There is a glimpse of the culture of the Native Red Indians and how they slowly embrace modernity. In the reflections of loss and hope, a young wife, mother, sibling, and caretaker for an aging parent weaves in her professional quest.

Amidst political turmoil and a growing divide based on religion and community, our author, a feminist and flag-bearer of justice, is often disheartened, yet she gains strength in her artistic explorations. Part 2 of the book is a tender testimony of the love that only a child can feel for parents who devoted their lives to finding another haven for their children. It is, then, the sweet burden of the children to do their best to create something worthwhile for the next generation. It’s not an effortless task when time has changed the landscape and people have drifted apart. “Things don’t die, they become shells. Life then continues in different ways.”

From anecdotes related to writing a book or creating a home production to deciphering ancient scriptures and culture, or talking about a quiet evening with the family and its pet, the narration is brimming with memories. The reader can only imagine the writer’s nostalgia as she brings out precious and delicate recollections on paper. The book is bound to touch and inspire the reader in more ways than one as it meanders down memory lane. It would be a treat to see a web series on the vibrant ethnic communities that are documented in this book. 

Book Review: Freddy’s Magic Garden

Freddy’s Magic Garden -Angelin Dayan- Book Cover

Book: Freddy’s Magic Garden

Author: Angelina Dayan

Genre: Biographies, memoirs, stories

Review copy: Reedsy Discovery

Available at: Amazon.in

Recommended: Must Read

Get yourself a little something this Valentine’s Day – A delightful, warm, and fuzzy book that tells of feline adventures and is brimming with utmost love and affection.

Freddy’s Magic Garden by Angelina Dayan is a warm and fuzzy novella, perfect for the winter months. It contains stories filled with much love and affection for our furry friends. It is about friendship, guardianship, and hope. The book has been written with much tenderness and the feelings ooze out of the pages, instantly warming the heart.

With human and feline narrators, the storytelling is lively and can make for a good bedtime read for children. The cat portraits give faces to the names of frolicky balls of fur. A more vibrant portfolio of the cats in different settings around the house and garden would have made this into an exotic coffee-table book. The book is a testimony of how caring for fur babies, tugs at your heartstrings and can keep you up at night and days, in anxiety for their well-being. The commitment to care for another living being is difficult and must only be taken up if one will go the extra mile.

The stories of the cats, as told in their voice, are engaging and humorous. You feel drawn into their world. From their experiences with the breeders to waiting for their human family, to antics and escapades, these cats have a full life of adventure. In Uddy’s escapades, the author seems to channel Orwell’s Animal Farm, including a visionary piglet. There is a reference to Elon Musk’s feline alter ego, and it’s hilarious – “What you need, Uddy is to go to Mars. But hurry up before that human gets ahead of you, that Mewlon Husk,” he advised. I would have loved more farm stories, but it was a small part of the larger feline saga.

This is a fabulous book to understand the world of cats, particularly Maine Coons. As it is with life, the cats face losses and challenges, but with love and care, they bounce back. With the largesse of the heart, even a small home can become a heaven for little bundles of joy. The cat family grows by leaps and bounds and there is much joy to be shared and observed. Freddy’s Magic Garden is a perfect book for animal lovers and if you can not get enough of these stories, then like me, you can top it up with a 2022 Netflix film – Inside the mind of a cat.

The stories they told!

Writers often lament writer’s block and procrastination as colossal hurdles to a regular writing practice. While both hold a genuine place in the writers’ list of woes, it is my experience that nothing is a bigger enemy of the creative journey than ill-disposed mental health. One can create masterpieces in sorrow and carve out brilliant art in happiness but it is hard to get a grip on artistic pursuits when one is stressed or anxious. 

A stack of books and an open notebook

Since mid-November 2022 until now I have been struggling – first with a long spell of flu that lasted for a month and a half. Then, somewhere during this difficult time, debilitating worry and paranoia found their way into my life. I was trapped in a maze of repetitive thoughts and stress-induced negativity. I tried many things to heal my mind but it was a lonely journey.

The biggest casualty of my mental ill-health was my poetry. I realize how delicate a device poetry is. It demands total dedication. A disrupted mental frame cannot do justice to the pursuits of the poet. 

One of the tools recommended for mindfulness and healing is journaling. I do vouch for its benefits but that is a post for another day. What I discovered amidst these trials was that for me story writing is closer to journaling.

As my physical health gradually recovered after Christmas, I came across the Penfluenza 3.0 contest by WriteFluence. I decided to start writing because the theme of Ritual called out to me. Each day, I poured a lot of love and care into my draft. It slowly became a healthy diversion. My mind would be at ease at least in those crafting moments. The story itself was therapeutic.

My efforts were worthwhile because when the contest results were declared, I was glad to know that my short story was one of the winning entries. Today, I received a heartwarming message that the anthology that contains my short story is now available for purchase. Read about The Selection of a Sacred Strawberry.

Meanwhile, I tried to go back to my favorite daily activity of writing for poetry prompts. It didn’t happen. Thoughts arrived wrapped in imagery but the words wouldn’t manifest. I felt for my forsaken blog but when you are broken, you can’t create a piece that is as fragile as poetry. Short story, in my case, was the sturdier sibling of the poem!

This weekend, I returned to my blog to publish a book review. Some words formed and then they started to string together. I am not sure if I will be able to write frequently because unresolved issues still camp in my mind space. But I am trying – each day – to let go of what I cannot control and to get a grip on the things I can create.

As I try to recover, sharing what I wrote last night:

All through the days so cold
I wanted to write
But the words had died
Slithering away in a whirlpool
Of frantic anxiety;
When they knocked at my door
I struggled to make sense
Of the jumbled letters.

I stood at the threshold
Surrounded by the bellows of
Unrelenting stress and misery
I could barely stay afloat
Wallowing in fear and self-pity,
So, I shut them all out –
Now no one will ever know
The stories those words told!

Book Review: Millennial Apocalyp$e 

Millennial Apocalyp$e -Zane Brown – Book Cover

Book: Millennial Apocalyp$e Why You and Other Millennials Are Tracking Toward Financial Disaster and How You Can Avoid It

Author: Zane Brown

Genre: Non-fiction, business, self-help

Review copy: Reedsy Discovery

Available at: Amazon.in

Recommended: Loved It

This a thought-provoking and insightful book for our times, with relevance for a wide audience interested in the psychology of the millennials.

The fear of recession and the current doldrums that our economy is braving is directly impacting millennials. The sudden dissemination of the Big Tech bubble and its ripple across several digitalized segments is causing a lot of concern with markets in a tizzy. In this well-timed and relevant book, financial strategist Zane Brown, and psychologist Dr. Donalee Brown address the conditions, fears, and proposed solutions around the financial well-being of millennials.

The book is primarily targeted towards an American audience with many references to laws, socio-economic situations, and even research centered on the American ecosystem. However, most insights are valid for an international audience and informative for all who want to understand the global economy and millennial psychology.

I recommend this book as a thought-provoking and insightful study of the world of millennials. It helps us understand how their sense of entitlement, risk aversion, internet addiction, self-aggrandizement, behavioral biases, distrust in banks and traditionally organized financial organizations in favor of cryptocurrencies, and even financial PTSD – all of this crumples up the modern social fabric. This book explains how late marriages, high student debts, delayed or no real estate investment, and zero retirement plans are keeping millennials on the precipice of a financial disaster.

The book offers advice and aims at pulling millennials out of the rut of choosing to remain uninformed and risk-averse while making unhealthy financial decisions. This is an important book for a wide audience – parents, educators, leaders, and of course, the young generation, who are not getting straightforward answers on what 2023 and beyond hold for the world. We are living in a stressful time – a book that acknowledges this and offers succor in practical ways while validating the concerns of our generation – is a must-read book.

The research, analysis, examples, and explanations make this an engaging read. However, the descriptive content is often repetitive, as if to meet a certain word count. A better way to handle this would have been to include graphics, tables, line drawings, or caricatures, which this book lacks. Yet, this is a necessary book for its advice related to deep analysis, personal connections with professional and financial advisors, delayed gratification, and patience for the millennials.

Book Review: My Name is Cinnamon

My Name is Cinnamon – book cover

Book: My Name is Cinnamon (Hay House 2022)

Author: Vikas Prakash Joshi

Genre: Young Adult Fiction

Review copy: Provided by the Author

Available at: Amazon.in

Recommended: Must Read

A colorful yet touching story of an Indian teenager

My Name is Cinnamon by Vikas Prakash Joshi is a young adult novel on a sensitive theme. The story refreshingly starts with a football match and childhood fun and frolic. It slowly courses through the harsher travails of destiny. Cinnamon, or Roshan, is a lanky and dreamy teenager, who is puzzled by questions about his identity. He keeps filing them “away in his ‘Questions to ask later’ folder” until the need to know the answers overwhelms him.

Amidst pranks and banter with friends to woes and worries of academics, we get an engaging story of adolescence. It’s also a story about the charms and struggles of parenting. There are insights into Bengali culture, particularly food, and Marathi daily life. No Indian tale is complete without the quintessential train journey, an uncomfortable bus ride, and quirky neighbors and relatives. In this story, Kolkata emerges in all its beauty and uniqueness, and so does a quaint township in the Indian hinterlands.

The book reminds us of adventures written by beloved Indian writers like RK Narayan, Sudha Murthy, and Ruskin Bond. The drawings and caricatures add another flavor to the book. Even with all the colorful narration, I felt the book needed some editing that could have endowed it with a more literary appeal. For me, some incidents were predictable despite the humor, drama, and pace. However, the book makes its mark in the genre of young adult fiction and holds the promise of a sequel or even a graphical or serial novella about Cinnamon, our teenage protagonist.

My Name is Cinnamon has wholesome messaging around the touching topic of adoption. Books for Indian children are always a treat and it’s great to read one that bundles up positive social ideas and lesser-known information. You can grab a copy to capture the nostalgia of being a teenager and to learn whether Cinnamon gets the answers he has been seeking. In the end, you will definitely walk away with some inspiring and useful information that raises awareness and makes the book a worthwhile read.

Additional links shared by the author:

Interview in Greece: https://eatdessertfirstgreece.com/2021/08/21/vikas-prakash-joshi/

Interview in The Hindu: https://bit.ly/3lmDFwT

Interview by TEQ Book Club: https://bit.ly/3DUwE0s

Interview in Pune Mirror: https://bit.ly/3yMIR4R

International School of Kenya: Following dreams challenging

About the Book: noisyvision.org/2021/10/28/my-name-is-cinnamon-a-book-by-Vikas-prakash-joshi/

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