Shutter Island - Book Review

Recently, I have started reading a lot of fiction & non-fiction that were converted to popular movies - e.g. The Lincoln Lawyer, The Blind Side and  Stardust. 

Shutter Island

In that tradition, the recent novel i picked up was "Shutter Island". Extremely well written book that really surprises you at the end. One of the problems with reading a story after seeing a movie is that - you always see the characters shown by the director rather than the character created by the author while writing the book. e.g.  I always see Daniel Radcliffe while reading Harry Potter Series.  This book was an exception to that case - which is a testament of the thought-out characterization by the author. (I saw only the early few minutes and not the entire movie)

Though this is not a page-turner, it still keeps you interested enough to mull over and come back to the book. But the surprising climax is the highlight of the book. 

Rating: 3.5/5

My Comment: Good book to read a little bit everyday. But might not be the right book to pick for a flight trip.

Photo Source: hcplebranch

Outliers – Book Review

Based on the recommendations of the various bloggers I follow, I decided to read “Outliers”. Man! I was impressed. Though the book does not open up your mind in a big way, a few key points that the book brings out will change the way you assess a person.

Key Points:

• It showed me that Personal Success depends hugely on being at the right place and at the right time. [For e.g. Entrepreneurs from IIM – A – 1989 Batch is hugely higher than other batches, All the Tech Entrepreneurs belong to the same age group, etc.. ]
• It deciphers with statistics that Personal Success depends on growing up in the right family, right school, etc..  Though I.Q. Levels make a difference for your first job. Afterwards, it is the other factors – Growing up in the right family, right school, etc. that leads to Success in your domain.
• It is essential to put in 10,000 Hours of Practice to really become great. (i.e. Sachin become great only after putting in 10,000 Hours of Batting Practice, Tiger Woods, became great only after putting in those hours, Beattles became great only after practicing for 10,000 Hours)

Just for Bringing out these points, I believe that the book is worth the money I paid.